BruceH

I've long thought of the The Dick Van Dyke show as one of the best sitcoms of all time. People love to harsh my buzz by saying, "I never liked the kid," or some such. Yeah. Well, no show is perfect I guess... But dang if it wasn't pretty damn awesome.

Damn. He all but came back from the dead, career-wise. RIP

Spain?

Indeed. And a former hobo to boot.

Exactly. I always took it about the same way I took all those stories of kids jumping off their parents roof with a home-made cape, trying to emulate Superman.

I agree. And I've got to give the guy credit: According to one obit, while he was helping out Nixon with an anti-drug campaign, Linkletter came to the conclusion that marijuana was not all that harmful, and shouldn't be included on any list of "hard" drugs. Now there's an example of thinking for oneself.

I remember practically growing up with that story about Art Linkletter's daughter throwing herself out of a building because of acid. I also remember thinking it sounded like an urban-legend, bogeyman type of story, to scare kids away from LSD. Whatever the truth that lay at the bottom of it, the thing took on those characteristics.

You look at that clip that Jim posted and it's clear Linkletter wasn't suffering from Alzheimer's. I had no idea he spent some time during the Depression as a hobo.

I too was under the vague impression that he had left us some time ago. What a run he had. RIP

"I know you didn't pull the trigger son; but two people are dead and y---"

Hey, stars gotta eat.

Damned if that thing didn't get me turned on to T-Men, one of my favorite crime B-movies of all time.

"Douchie"?

Been revisiting some old episodes of Homicide lately. These days, that show would have been on cable.

Season 3 is quite good as I recall. But then, I'm a fan.

Wow. One of those guys that I sort of assumed would keep on going forever. (And I still suck at math.) RIP

At the height of my Vonnegut phase my favorite was Cat's Cradle. What are some of the stories in this anthology? Amazon won't tell me a thing. John D Clark, "Minus Planet" (1937) Fritz Leiber, "Yesterday House" (1952) Larry Niven, "Neutron Star" (1966) Lester del Rey, "The Faithful" (1938) Don Wilcox, "The Voyage That Lasted 600 Years" (1940) - that's as far as I've got! Gee, the only one of those I'm familiar with is "Neutron Star."

What are some of the stories in this anthology? Amazon won't tell me a thing.

That's an excellent biography--I was (and am) somewhat the same way about Elvis, Matthew. It's interesting to read Guralnick's book just for the sense of how and why he became so important to American culture in the late 1950s. Guralnick was born to write this book. Although his other music-related books are worth checking out too.

Ah! Just what I thought!

Mike, what did you think of the latest episode of Breaking Bad? I managed to miss the damn thing.

A long and productive life, to be sure. RIP

Hawk Eyes!---Coleman Hawkins

Hurray!! (Although I find it a bit comical---not surprising, just comical---that selling only 50,000 copies lands you at #2 on the "jazz album chart.")

Nice album. Got myself some more Coleman Hawkins recently: Night Hawk The Genius of Coleman Hawkins